March 30, 2009

CableFAXIES Awards: Marketing of a Continuing Series

Winner: BBC America for Robin Hood Season 2

BBC America dedicated a chunk of its campaign budget for the second season of Robin Hood to outdoor advertising in New York, Los Angeles and Philadelphia, including a video board in Times Square. It also tested new technology, placing ground-level storefront window wraps in key neighborhoods that transmitted a trailer to anyone in the area with a Bluetooth-equipped mobile phone. Looking to generate goodwill with Comcast during carriage talks, BBC hired actors in Philadelphia dressed as Robin, Marian and several of the Merry Men to open cab doors, help carry groceries and perform other good deeds. Although the actors didn’t take from the rich and give to the poor, ratings for the second season of Robin Hood jumped 128%, and the Saturday run grabbed the largest DVR audience for BBC America of any night of the week. BBC also booked several top-shelf advertisers for the show, including Miramax and Hyundai.

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Winner: Oxygen for Tori & Dean: Home Sweet Hollywood

Oxygen focused on New York and Los Angeles to hype the return of Tori & Dean. It bought above- and below-ground billboards in New York, and reached for the skies in L.A., hiring skywriters to plug the show. It even had Tori Spelling and hubby Dean record greetings that ran on TV screens in NYC taxis, and wrapped elevators at NBC Universal’s 30 Rockefeller Plaza building from floor to ceiling with Tori & Dean creative. Oxygen hired chauffeurs to hold signs at various gates at L.A. International Airport pretending to welcome back the couple and locals walked red carpets that touted the series at restaurants and nightclubs. Street teams in "Welcome Home! Tori & Dean" T-shirts were deployed. In addition to national, local cable and spot TV, Oxygen advertised on PerezHilton.com, People.com and other sites popular with fans of the show. The marketing push helped make the premiere of the second season of Tori & Dean the highest-rated and most-watched season premiere of an Oxygen original series ever.

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Honorable Mentions:

AMC and NMA Entertainment & Marketing for Mad Men Season 2: Viewership jumped 63% during the second season of Mad Men after a campaign from AMC and NMA that featured promos on VOD screens in 302 Delta airplanes, plugs from Alex Trebek and a category on Jeopardy!, ads in hotels wired by LodgeNet and a viral marketing campaign with Evite.

Sundance Channel for Iconoclasts Season 4: Sundance continued featuring its iconic photographs of intimate moments between celebrities and a "change the way you see celebrity" tagline to tout season 4 of Iconoclasts.

World Wrestling Entertainment for WWE McMahon’s Million Dollar Mania Promotion: More than 6 million wrestling fans submitted entries after WWE founder Vince McMahon promised to give away $1 million of his own money weekly to promote Monday Night Raw on USA Network. Viewing jumped 25% in the three weeks following the start of "McMahon’s Million Dollar Mania."

ABC Family for The Secret Life of the American Teenager Season 2 Launch: The second season premiere ranked as ABC Family’s No. 1 telecast of all time for teens 12 to 17, thanks to a broad campaign featuring print, in-theater spots, national and local TV, radio and online advertising.

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